Mombasa Now

Killings by police of death

Perhaps the most surprising outcome of my visit was the extent to which I received overwhelming testimony of the existence of systematic, widespread, and carefully planned extrajudicial executions undertaken on a regular basis by the Kenyan police. The Police Commissioner in particular, along with various other senior officials, assured me that no such killings take place. But he and his colleagues appear to be the only people in the entire country who believe this claim.

I have received detailed and convincing reports of countless individual killings. It is clear from the many interviews that I conducted that the police are free to kill at will. Sometimes they do so for reasons of a private or personal nature. Sometimes they kill in the context of extortion, or of a ransom demand. Often they kill in the name of crime control, but in circumstances where they could readily make an arrest. My final report will review the evidence in some detail.

I met with the father and brother of Dr. James Ng’ang’a Kariuki Muiruri, a 29 year old man with three law degrees from the United Kingdom and who had been teaching there. He was killed by police on 24 January 2009 in Nairobi. After a disagreement at a hotel, a police officer stopped the car James and his brother were in, and ordered James to handcuff himself. When he asked why he was being arrested, James was shot three times. The only exceptional things about the case were that James was the son of a former Member of Parliament, and the incident had been witnessed. Otherwise it followed a common pattern. The police officer responsible for the shooting filed a report that a bank robber and Mungiki member had been killed, thus invoking the magic formula designed to ensure that no one would question the need to shoot the suspect dead.

One only has to read the Kenyan newspapers to know that alleged robbers are shot and killed every day of the week by the police in Nairobi alone.

Under international law applicable in Kenya lethal force is only permissible as an act of self-defence or in defence of the life of another. Insofar as s 71 of the Constitution of Kenya permits lethal force beyond this limited scope by allowing such force “for the defense of property” or “for the purpose of suppressing a riot”, it violates clear international standards and should be amended.

More topics in this report:

Police death squads

Zero accountability for police killings

and more

(more…)

Since the beginning of time humans and animals has lived close to the water. And tourists draws to water too to relax and take a good swim. But some tourists do things they wouldn’t dare to do in their own country. At home they would suffer prosecution, their neighbours and relatives would know and in jail they would get hell as hurting a child is a no-no even for a murderer. But when “this” European, American, Australian, Japanese (not exclusivle only) comes to a country like Kenya, Thailand or Lithuania with high rates of people with low or no income these tourists thinks it’s ok to abuse children. Well.. it’s not! No matter where it is!

/Peter

The recent incident in which 18 children were rescued from the hands of suspected child traffickers from an unregistered children’s home in Likoni, Mombasa, is an ominous sign that the Coast is becoming a human trafficking gateway.

The children were later returned to their homes in Mwatate constituency, Taita District.

Children, especially those from poor families and those from the streets are increasingly being lured into these homes, with promises of better lives, but instead, they end up being abused by the owners of these homes.

In the Likoni incident, the 18 children were reportedly being exposed to harsh and inhuman conditions, while being offered one meal a day.

Unregistered homes

“The main problem has been caused by the proliferation of unregistered children’s homes where child traffickers masquerade as philanthropists, only to turn into beasts and abuse their charges,” says Taita-Taveta children’s officer George Migosi.

Poverty and child neglect also contribute to the problem, according to Mr Migosi, as some parents fail to fend for their children and see it fit to give them away to the homes.

Mr Migosi pointed out that out of the 18 children rescued from Mombasa, four were from the same family. They are being held at Mwatate Children’s home.

“The father, who has since parted with his wife, has a case to answer for neglecting the children, and saw it fit to give them away to the woman who has since been exposed as a child trafficker,” said Mr Migosi.

The woman from Mwachabo Location in Mwatate has since been arrested together with a male accomplice.

Joyce Bahati Wali and Mr Paul Nzuku Katha have been charged in a Voi court for conspiring to engage in child trafficking and are out on bond, awaiting fresh charges to be preferred against them by the Children’s Department.

Human rights groups have, on many occasions, rang alarm bells over the issue of child slavery especially in Malindi and Mombasa, where tourists engage in sexual abuse of underage girls, as well as sexually assaulting boys.

There have also been fears that some corrupt children’s officers connive with the traffickers to cover up the evil.

“Some of the senior children’s officers could be involved in the child trafficking scandals, as it beats logic why such a vice could take root in society and yet they are supposed to investigate these things,” says a volunteer officer in Mwatate, Mr Eric Mbaruk.

Kenya has been cited as one of the origins of children trafficked into the UK and other countries in Africa.

In September last year, police in Western Province smashed a racket involving child traffickers, which had been going on for years.

During the incident, officers, posing as potential customers, arrested a key “supplier” and four others in Kericho Town. One of the key suspects, a woman, brought children from a village in Emuhaya.

Many children trafficked in the country end up in major towns working as house helps and baby-sitters.

A Congolese woman was also charged recently in a Nairobi court with trafficking children.

The woman was accused of taking the children to DRC to work in the commercial sex industry.

In the UK, an estimated 500 African children a year, many of them babies, are being trafficked and end up working as virtual slaves.

The revelations were made late last year when it is said children were sold by their poor parents for up to $10,000 (Sh630,000 million).

Teenage girls

An undercover reporter, working for the Daily Telegraph newspaper, was offered several children for sale by their parents in Nigeria: Two boys aged three and five for $10,000, or $5,000 for one, and a 10-month-old baby for $4,000.

Teenage girls – including some still pregnant – were willing to sell their babies for less than $2,000.

The Telegraph report said that “impoverished African parents are being lured by the traffickers’ promises of ‘a better life’ for their children, thousands of kilometres away.

But, once brought to Britain, the children are used as a fraudulent means to obtain illicit housing and other welfare benefits, totalling tens of thousands of dollars each a year.

Pascal Mwandambo And Sam Kiplagat
Nairobi

Source:

http://allafrica.com/stories/200804151281.html

Sydsvenskan

The council has turned Kibarani, which was supposed to be a garbage dropping point, into a dump site. It lacks the means to transport the huge volume of garbage generated daily from Kibarani to Mwakirunge 20 km away.

Council workers often burn the rotting garbage at Kibarani, setting off clouds of thick smoke along the Makupa Causeway, that inconveniences motorists, commuters and tourists en route to their hotels from Moi International Airport.

At night, the dump site is used as a hideout by highway robbers who attack people along the Makupa Causeway.

Deputy Mayor Mcharo said the council will spend Sh50 million from the Local Authority Transfer Fund to upgrade the drainage system.

He said a second sewage treatment plant will be built in the North Coast.

"The drainage system was meant for a small population and it is now overstretched. We are also replacing the stolen metal covers with cement ones to secure the system from blockage," he said.

Patrick Mayoyo, Gitonga Marete And Mathias Ringa

Source:

http://allafrica.com/stories/200804141072.html

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